Miles and Miles
by chossytoss
Summary: A reflection through Ziva's perspective as she walks away from the Damocles and what was left of her team. Because it was the only way. And because she will never get another chance. Angsty one-shot.


_Writing something in first person is something new for me, so let me know what you think. And I realize the Somalia plot-things are a little recycled at this point, but we all know what happens when something gets in your head. Anyway, read and enjoy :)_

* * *

I am here in the stagnant haze of nowhere, and I am not sure what I know.

I know there is sand, endless sand, and it stretches to the edges of my vision and back again. It crinkles like gravel under my sole and constantly shifts beneath my boots as I walk. It stings my eyes and clings to my skin and turns everything a soft shade of dusty brown.

I know it is hot, unbelievably so. And the desert spares no kindness for me.

I know the salty sweat has soaked through my back. The dampness sticks to my shirt and the back of my neck, and the guns at my waist and ankle chafe against my clammy skin. Perhaps it weighs me down, but this is not the first time I have trekked like this.

I know it will be the last.

Perhaps it hurts more to say that than I realize. I do not know.

At this point all I know is that I have no certainty left.

It has been taken from me. I am not sure by who, and I do not even know how. But all I know is that it's gone and there is sand underneath me and everywhere.

On the outside it swirls and sticks and tints everything to its liking, but on the inside there is nothing there. I feel nothing.

Just gravity.

I am not sure if you realize what it cost for me to be here, now, in the desert, walking to my fate. And do not confuse fate with destiny, because destiny only sugarcoats the one constant in history - murder. Though for me, perhaps that fits - even if the price for mine is higher than even I had control of.

I am about to die.

I do not, would not, ask for pity or solace or words that soothe.

I only wanted you to know.

I am not sure if you _truly_ know what I am about to do. You have tasted it, I know, you have felt it with every fiber of your being. Hanging over you, taunting you as you waited for it. I think you know what it feels like, to be waiting for death. But you have never wanted to make that choice for yourself.

Not like me.

I think again.

I never actually had a choice.

_But I followed anyway._

And that has to count for something, somewhere along the fault line.

I am not sure if you ever believed all the things I told you, whether they were true or not.

As my heavy footfalls came down those stairs and I hovered over his dead body with prayer and sorrow on my lips, I made you believe that the brother I had killed was not the brother I had once loved. And that I could, did, sacrifice his blood so that others may live.

Perhaps that was the first lie.

Because even as I stood over his corpse, bleeding out from the wound I dealt, I still loved him.

And I should have known better. I should have known not to bring one world into another, should have known that I could not be a part of both. Though now, with Rivkin dead and Mossad betrayed and you so very far away, I am only a part of my own.

It is a lesson I should have learned from my father a long time ago.

All. Or none.

I wonder if it is naïve to think that things would have been any different if I had.

I am not sure if you will remember me when this has passed and you are left to your thoughts. Remember that when it comes down to it, I tried. Tried to change, tried to hide from everything that I left behind.

Maybe it could have worked, I do not know.

Though if there remains a difference between who I am and who I used to be, I can't feel it.

I am not sure if you meant to hurt me, when you gave me that kiss and those engines roared to life. When I spoke to you I still had something, _someone_, left. And there was a part of me that knew, dreaded even, that I would not be getting on that plane.

I will not ask, because your words (or lack of them) were clear.

You gave up on me.

I am not sure if you meant it to sting the way it did. Maybe this would be easier if you had, though in my head the thought resonates of a lie. Like so many other things.

I am not sure if you will regret your decision, leaving me the way you did. Your touch and your focus meant you knew what you were doing. No hesitation in those hands and no doubt in those steeled features, but something was off.

It wasn't _your_ eyes that sent that signal, that small flash of dilemma.

It was mine.

And still you left.

Something else I should have learned, should have realized before it happened. Before I _made_ it happen. Because Tony is not _like_ a son to you, he is a son to you. And through all of his greatest trials and your biggest challenges, all that you have been through, you could never leave him or let him go like that.

You love him, and you are proud.

Something heavy tears at my chest from the inside, and the stinging returns.

_I am not sure if you loved me like that too._

But I have no use for these scars. My hours are numbered anyway.

I can see the courier waiting up ahead, a dark outline in a dulled desert horizon. He will bring me to what my life has led me to, what we all prepare for in the end.

No anxiety. No fear. No tension - but do not mistake that for professionally vigorous training or the ever-reaching arm of the iron will.

I just have nothing left.

There is sand beneath my feet, and the sweat clings to my back. The skyline is fading into a blaze of red and orange.

I am about to die.

I am not sure if you'll forgive me.

But I think you will understand.

_It is what it is._

You always do.

Shalom, Gibbs.

* * *

_All done! Short I know, but what can I say? Please leave a review and be on your merry way :)_


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